las-vegas-nv-9-23-00-saturday
Title: las-vegas-nv-9-23-00-saturday
Author: Matt "Phobos" Berta
Date: Sep 25, 2000
Pre: Got more sleep this time, about 5 hours (that’s better than usual). Listened to my power music again beforehand, Godsmack. Voodoo right before I left. Get there at about 10:02, I’m the 8th player. We fill out our own command cards, cuz Chris Hines brought some. As he’s collecting the $5 entry fees from everyone, TD Dan Christy and John Spadora walk in, so 9 players means a "bye". Suck. Where are the Green Valley guys?
Game 1: My DS Godsmack Hunt Down vs Chris Hines’ (1898) HB Mains.
Cool, a tough opponent for the start. I start Oppressive Enforcement, Mobilization Points and Imp. Arrest Order. He starts Strike Planning, Insurrection, and Insight. I have no Vader in hand, which is a bummer. I do have a Mara, Imp. Cmd, Exe: DB, Twi’Lek, Executor, etc. He uses Strike to pull General Calrissian as I pull Rendili. Apparently he has his other General in his hand. I pull DS:DB, notice there’s 4 of my 5 Vaders in there, so a DLOTS is activated. Drop the Exe:DB from hand, draw for that DLOTS and other stuff. Visage off top is a Tarkin, damn. His turn, he drops Honor from his hand. Great. Fortunately it only works against me for that 1 turn. He also gets Endor from Reserve by his OBJ. My turn, Vader drops to the DS:DB from last turn, flip, get CC:DB from reserve, draw the rest. His turn he sacs Insight for Squad. Assign, and uses it w/Calrissian to get Gold Sq. 1, deploys to Endor. Gen. Solo hops on as well. He saves 1 for Barrier paranoia of Zucky but I don’t have him, yet. I let him sit there and drain for a few turns because I quickly got sabers for my Jedi Killers at the dbays, and am out-draining him. Next few turns, he gets 1/0 systems from reserve, and reinforces Endor with some Red pilot in matching ship. The turn after I draw Zucky in ship! Damn psychic. So, I drop the Chimaera with Adms. Ozzel and Chiraneau to Rendili, to make him come to me, and now I’ve got 3 BG’s to ignore Honor. See, pretty easy! We don’t *need* No Escape, but hell, I’m gonna use it, of course. By this time he’s got Jedi Luke and his saber in his hand, so as he spends 8 to drop him to get up in Mara’s umm... face, I’m stoked because I have Obsession and Focused in hand. Before he drops the saber, I say, "lets duel!" and he SENSES the damn thing! I have no Alter in hand, DAMMIT!, so I say go for it, and he succeeds, drawing a BEN for destiny. At least I don’t have to concern myself with him for awhile. Luke gets his saber and then battles, swings at Mara but doesn’t have the balls to cut her. Shannon Baksa swings back, but remember’s Mark Hamill’s goofy picture on the back of BHBM, so she misses, laughing inwardly in the middle of battle. Damn @#$% always gets distracted by something. Destiny time, he draws a 2 and I draw a feckin 1, difference of 5, I think I’d rather keep her and lose the 5. So Luke runs away like the punk he is because his future wife will abuse him if he stays. He also sends the Generals on the Falcon to go harass my crew at Rendili. Bummer the Red guy can’t make it, he would have then been Zuckuss-proof. But oh well, his bad. My turn Zuckuss comes to Rendili and it’s punishment time for him. I battle, I think I play Imp. Cmd. to add a destiny (thank you BrahmaBull) and wipeout the two pilots. I give chase to Luke with Vader, since the only sites out are dbays, he can never run too far. During his control phase I disarm the kid, and now he knows he’s just going to have to try and kill Vader, so he drops a few other guys, I choke Cracken I believe, slice at Luke w/a tracked 6 and 3, and draw decent enough destiny to limit my battle damage loss to about 4 (including Orrimaarko, that jackass), while clearing off his side. After that he didn’t have any more Jedi to flip me with, so I was able to drain and Visage burn him out and win by 14. 2(+14)
Highs: Not making any mistakes against a player who I respect, and playing quickly.
Lows: Drawing crappy battle destiny once against Luke. Only getting out 5 or 6 of the 19 characters in my deck.
Game 2: My LS ROps Killa vs Shane Watner’s (1637) SFS w/TIE Interceptors
Ah yes, Mr. Up-And-Coming himself. This guy only started playing maybe 4 or 5 months ago, but he’s had many good teachers and it shows. He starts the DS 2:Throne Room w/Mob. Pts., Opp. Enf., and There Is No Try, possibly the card I hate the most in this game. He pulls Wakeelmui right away, deploying it and Kessel, and drawing some force. I start with Ben, Leia, 3 Eloms, Signal, Hoth:DB and some other red in my hand, but no S/A. Suck. So I play the DB, search for the Home One:DB, Elom there for gen, save one to fake a Barrier in hand, done. He deploys a couple TIE Interceptors to Kessel, forgetting his -1. Next turn I Signal for Honor. Try for another DB, hoping for Tat so Ben can come down, but no luck. Spaceport"DB goes to Wak. Deploy Leia to backup the Elom cuz he saved some force. His turn, drain, more TIEs to Kessel, draws a few. I get that Tat:DB out and Ben goes there, Leia and friend transit to chill w/him, draw up some S/A’s. He tries Seinar but has nothing at Wak so it gets Altered to his Used, lose my Alter but no else (Honor). He gets U-3PO to Tat and I’m not gonna damage him for anything very soon. Emperor to his Room, gets Emp’s Power. More TIEs to Sullust, now I’m getting worried, but fortunately I can Signal for Bargain Table. I sit and draw like mad for Cantina, Falcon and Home One but never get Falcon. I get Savrip out, and Capt. Han deploys to Hoth DB, transits to Home:DB for Home One to come out next turn. His turn, drains and draws. Home One jumps on 3 TIEs at Sullust, battle, grab and Sense his All Power To Weapons, draw low, kill one TIE to Used, one lost, other survives so I can’t move out to stop other drains. Capt. Han moves to bridge to pilot. Then the beatings start. He plays First Strike, more TIEs, Emp’s Sword I think, retrieving craploads. Battle, he’s got 3 bg’s so I gotta lose off the top to First Str, Jedi Luke. Fetch. He stacks 2nd APTW, no Sense this time. He outpowers me by enough so I sac a Jedi Luke from hand, it was that or about 3 Eloms. I’m losing a lot in space and only hitting him for one a turn on the ground, it’s a downhill battle from there. He finally draws over Home One’s immunity with Emp’s Power when I have nothing for Savrip to eat, so bye bye Home One and Capt. Han. Drains me out in space, he wins by 20. 2(-6)
Highs: Capt. Han on a super Home One keeping hope alive for a little while. Finishing a game I thought would go to time.
Lows: No Falcon ENTIRE GAME. Sensing APTW and still losing battles. I need a better strategy against TIEs.
Game 3: LS against John Tingley’s (1407) SYCFA w/BOOM
He has no starting interrupt, but he’s actually playing 3 CPI’s and that kind of worries me. Death Star sites and Gunners start coming down and I know I need to invade FAST. Good thing for docking bay transit. I invade the DS but not before Alderaan turns to dust. He’s getting systems out and draining with Star Destroyers at +2, and I’m draining for a lot on the DS, so it’s a drain race game. He’s got Mon Cal, Sullust and Kessel with one unique SD at each, and I’ve got 3 Death Star sites garrissonned with Chewie and Elom at 1, Leia at another and Jedi Luke at a 3rd, chasing around 3 Gunners. Order to Engage hurts him once, then he fights Leia w/3 gunners, no spillover after she shoots one and attritions the other 2. I get Bargaining Table after taking about 10-12 in space drains, and Falcon w/Capt. Han and Harc Seff take out a couple SD’s before Zucky comes down to ruin my day. Savrip saves me from getting slaughtered, I run and OTE makes him battle with some unpiloted Star Dest., Zucky and friend giving chase. I’m able to run and have OTE and a LOT of ground drains do slightly more damage to him than he’s doing to me. FW by 12. 4(+6)
Highs: Winning the drain race, Harc Seff actually piloting for once. Jedi Luke on the 1st Death Star, thinking "I blew this damn thing away already!"
Lows: VERY close game, if I hadn’t had Savrip or Bar. Table, I would have lost.
Game 4: DS against John Tingley’s HB mains
Unfortunately I can’t play Tim Guzman the leader because of wacky matchups and only 9 players (damn you Vegas no-shows!). So anyway, John starts Squadron Assignments, Superficial Damage and Battle Order. I start the same as before and there’s a DLOTS in my hand. Things that don’t suck! Pull the usual stuff from Reserve, he goes, gets a system, some pilot and ship Squad. Assigns to Rendevous. I go, pull DS:DB, DLOTS there, Ozzel and Piett to CC:DB. Search and Destroy, YAHOO! That and Visage hit him for the rest of the game. He loses a lot of starship weapons to those and drains. He gets some more ships at the Point, but no weapons on them, moves to Roche, I deploy some guys up to fight there, Zuckuss too, battles and stuff find me losing nothing and him sacking some pilots. Ground drains wear him down, and I hold my ground most of the time in space, losing very little to drains. FW by 23. 6(+29)
Highs: Dominating the ground, surviving in space. Very short game.
Low: Having to play someone twice out of 4 games really bites.
So the final standings are:
1. Tim Guzman 8(+50) He played Noah and Shane twice each. Lucky guy.
2. Matt Berta 6(+29) <-me
3. Chris Hines 6(+15) I was his only loss
4. Shane Watner 4(+6)
5. Noah Singer 4(-15)
6. John Tingley 4(-17)
7. Ted Hansen 3(-5) TW against Spadora
8. John Spadora 2(-36)
9. Andrew Nelson 2(-37) new guy, first sanctioned tournament.
So it went decent, if more players had showed and we’d played 6 games I could have come up against Tim for the 1st place. I got 2 packs DS 2 (Onyx 1 and Home One:War Room) and 3 of Cloud City (not opening em). So it ended up being alright. Dan provided lots of evil sarcasm and humor. Listening to him and Shane and John is a riot, as long as you don’t become the target of their laughter.
Damn I can’t wait until D-con.